Untitled Your Body Is A Battleground, By Barbara Krusher

A commentary is an expression of opinions or offering of explanations about an event, topic, issue or situation. Barbara Kruger is an American conceptual and feminist artist who juxtaposes images with provocative words or statements. Within the short statements, she synthesises a comment on society, the economy, politics, gender, and culture. Kruger uses images from magazines and sets them as the background in her artworks, against confronting and bold messages. Kruger uses the colour red in her works, to immediately attract the viewers’ attention, “I want people to be drawn into the space of the work. And a lot of people are like me in that they have relatively short attention spans. So, I shoot for the window of opportunity.” She deals “with
It was designed in 1989, specifically for the reproductive rights protest (the March for Women's Lives) in Washington, D.C. Kruger has used her signature red, black, and white palette, and photography silkscreen on vinyl in ‘Untitled (Your Body Is a Battleground)’, which portrays a woman’s face split vertically, showing the photographic positive and negative sides. This contrast between the positive and negative halves suggest the inner struggle of good versus evil that women face. This background image is juxtaposed by the statement, “Your body is a battleground,” which is written in white letters and highlighted in red. The stark line straight through the middle of the woman’s face shows great symmetry; almost as if one side of the face is a mirror reflection of the other. This could represent the stereotypical image of the how women should ideally appear in society. As a result, the image’s history raises political issues about gender. The feminist art movement in the United States began in the early 1970s. This promoted the study, creation and understanding of women’s art. By the late 1980s, gender equality campaigns sought through its ‘third wave’. Feminists protested for the equality concerns of females who were previously marginalized in the ‘second wave’, such as, women from black and minority backgrounds. This movement would have influenced Kruger to create this piece as it alludes to a societal fabrication of women. ‘Untitled (Your Body Is a Battleground)’ is 284.5cm by 284.5cm in size. The vast size of this artwork suggests the size of the issues portrayed are very big and significant, which confronts the viewer and shows that these issues need to be talked about and resolved. The woman’s gaze is also very strong and looks straight at the viewer, which could be intimidating for some. However, despite the straight stare, it looks as though she is building up a